Historically, technical illustrations or drawings were typically created by draftspersons or graphic artists using standard drawing tools such as compasses, rulers, technical pens. French curves, and transfer screens. However, the manual approach was inefficient and difficult to modify, update or reproduce. The advent of computer technology made significant impact on the technical illustration field. Electronic systems, including computer aided design (CAD) and computer aided illustration systems such as those discussed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,408,601, entitled "GRAPHIC EDITOR," and in U.S. Pat. No. 5,490,241, entitled "INTERACTIVE COMPUTER GRAPHICS SYSTEM FOR MAKING PRECISE DRAWINGS," were designed to automate these tasks. Typically, these tools provided the user with a set of graphic primitives from which the user can generate more complicated constructs. The conventional graphical editing system was usually controlled by entering a command from a keyboard, by selecting a function key or icon, or by selecting a choice from a menu such as a fixed menu or a pop-up menu. For instance, to draw a line, the user clicked on a line icon and then specified the line by specifying two points using a mouse. Upon receipt of the second point designation, the system drew the line on the screen. To change the line length or direction, the user selected the line and moved the points specifying the line as necessary. Similarly, to specify a rectangle, the user merely selected a rectangle primitive, placed the primitive at the desired location, and finally move the end points of the rectangle to stretch the rectangle to the desired size using the mouse. In this manner, the anchor and control points were moved using the mouse to rapidly create geometric images and to manipulate the images by maneuvering their control points.
Although convenient, conventional computer aided design or illustration systems are not as intuitive to use as the pen and paper approach, as the editing process requires the user to remember various commands and object selection styles. Thus, the user must master many complex and arbitrary operations. For example, to find the proper commands, the user must traverse several nodes of a menu. By demanding that the draftsperson remember unique command and object selection sequence, the drawing system interface of the prior art reduces the efficiency of the draftsperson. Advances in computer hardware have not simplified life for users, since these advances have been largely employed to build more complex functions and modeling capability into the drawing screen with even more menus and sub-menus. The alternate solution of presenting a staggering array of incomprehensible icons is not also palatable to users. As such, many users only know a fraction of the available commands and features.
As the world advances toward the next computing millennium, users are being enticed to shift their processing from desktop based computers to portable computing appliances such as palmtop computers, wrist-watch computers, and eventually wearable computers. As a result of advances in microprocessor, memory and display technology, users are endowed with greater mobility and information on their fingertips. Modern portable computing appliances typically offer built-in applications which include, among others, an appointment book to keep track of meetings and to-do lists, a phone book to store phone numbers and other contact information, a notepad for simple word processing applications, a world time clock which shows time around the world and city locations on a map, a database for storing user specific data, a stopwatch with an alarm clock and a countdown timer, a calculator for basic computations and financial computations, and a spreadsheet for more complex data modeling and analysis. In addition to the built-in applications, add-on applications such as time and expense recording systems, filed by the present inventor in U.S. application Ser. No. 08/650,293 and entitled "TIME AND EXPENSE LOGGING SYSTEM", hereby incorporated by reference, can be added to increase the user's efficiency. Additionally, project planning tools, and CAD/CAM systems, among others, may be added to increase the functionality of portable computing appliances. Users benefit from these software, as the software allow users to be more productive when they travel as well as when they are in their offices.
Although simple drawing applications exist for portable computing appliances, they adopt the user interface of traditional computerized CAD systems or drawing software rather than employing interface objects which are familiar to the user so that the user can navigate the spreadsheet using intuitive knowledge rather than trained knowledge. Additionally. the functionality of portable computer-based spreadsheet software tends to be restricted due to the limited display screen. In general, more complex applications such as spreadsheets, databases, project planning tools, and CAD or drawing systems require large display areas to quickly and conveniently interact with users. However, portable computing appliances must balance the conflicting requirements of the readability of the displayed characters and the size of their display screens. On one hand, the portability requirement implies that the screen be small. On the other hand, the readability requirement pushes in the opposite direction and dictates that the display area be as large as possible. However, as computing appliances with large screens consume more power, more prone to breakage, and are less portable, most portable computers offer only a small display surface. The selection of a small display size restricts the user into making undesirable choices between displaying either larger characters or more information. For busy executives, attorneys, doctors and other professionals who are constantly on their feet and who do not have time to squint to decipher the miniaturized characters, such restrictions are overly burdensome. Thus, the display system needs to be portable, cost effective, and easy to use in comparison with the pen and paper approach before such computerized solution can replace the conventional pen and paper method. In addition to being as easy to use as the pen and paper approach, the portable computing appliance needs to provide information integration advantages over the cheaper pen and paper approach to further justify the expense associated with such electronic computer systems.
The ability to quickly create and attach text or graphical illustrations to a message, file, data set or recording media is needed in many applications, including photographic annotation and two-way communications. In the photography field, the annotation ability is needed by photographers to provide the capability of annotating each picture with words or graphical depiction regarding the circumstances and facts leading to the taking of the picture. The need arises as such annotation breathes life into the picture. Further, under certain occasions, the technical details underlying the photography session are needed. For example, when pictures are entered into a photography contest to be reviewed by the photographer's peers, certain camera settings used in producing a particular photographic effect are required with the submission of the photograph in these competitions. These technical data include the brightness, film speed, film type, shutter speed, f-stop setting, lens type, among others. Even when the photograph is not intended to be submitted in a photography contest, a detailed record of the photographic settings is important in many situations as professional photographers will photograph the same scene a number of times using different shutter speeds and aperture or f-stop settings. Additionally, amateur and professional photographers often desire to save comments associated with each picture such as the location, scenery, time and occasion for such photograph. Although text description is adequate for most situations, in certain instances, the ability to generate a drawing or illustration in conjunction with the photograph is highly desirable. These instances include the mapping of locations of sites along with the background scenery picture for space planners, utility workers, accident reconstructors, appraisers, inspectors, and architects, among others. In sum, in addition to business related reasons for annotating pictures, the availability of a picture description can considerably enhance the viewing pleasure of the picture for the viewing audience not privy to the logic or goal behind the taking of the pictures, or for photographers with poor recollections.
Conventionally, the photographer manually records the camera settings and annotations such as text and graphical data on a piece of paper and subsequently transfers the hand-recorded data onto the prints after they have been developed from negatives. Alternatively, the photographer can verbally record the comment utilizing a cassette recorder or the like and subsequently can transcribe the recording onto the picture or the sleeve of the associated negative. Naturally, the manual recording procedure is cumbersome and in many cases results in error in associating a particular data record with its corresponding negative or print. The use of separate written/dictated annotations is inherently disadvantageous because the annotations cannot be immediately attached to the appropriate negatives at the time of exposure. As these annotations need to be keyed to the photographs, the photographer may subsequently have a difficult time in properly associating the annotations with the photographs.
Although most components of the camera such as the lens, film winder, flash and metering equipment have improved greatly since the Daguerreotype of 1839, the tools for recording camera settings and annotating photographs have not advanced as rapidly. U.S. Pat. No. 3,590,703, issued Jul. 6, 1971 to Shigeo Ono, discloses an apparatus which automatically records shutter speed and lens aperture settings on film. This apparatus includes a complex optical and mechanical arrangement involving a large number of moving parts and is suitable for use with only a very limited selection of cameras. As a complex mechanical apparatus, the device disclosed in this patent must be built into the very heart of a camera during its manufacture, thereby rendering it difficult to service and impractical to install on existing cameras. Furthermore, the large number of parts and optical components add a great deal of highly undesirable additional weight to a camera. In addition, the cost of the precision parts involved is quite high, substantially increasing the manufacturing cost of a camera incorporating the apparatus.
Other devices for recording data on film strips are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,029,717, issued Apr. 17, 1962 to Hildebrandt and U.S. Pat. No. 3,603,974, issued Sep. 7, 1971 to Copeland, Jr. The devices disclosed in these patents employ electroluminescent techniques for recording data on photographic film in lieu of the complicated mechanical and optical system disclosed in Ono. The systems disclosed in Hildebrandt and Copeland, Jr. record only timing signals and the like on film, and are thus directed primarily in high-speed motion picture devices where such timing signals are important.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,843,956, issued to John J. Kauneckas, discloses the mounting of a light emitting diode display in a camera back such that the light emitting diodes engage edge portions of film within the camera. A switching system for controlling the light emitting diode display is coupled to the aperture and shutter speed adjusting mechanisms of the camera whereby the light emitting diode display is automatically adjusted to record the appropriate camera settings on edge portions of the film. However, the Kauneckas system is still quite complicated to manufacture and is incapable of recording parameters other than those that it has been designed for, namely the aperture and shutter speed settings.
Recently, a new consumer photography standard named Advanced Photo System (APS) has been developed which offers the ability to record certain camera settings and. using a keyboard, the ability to record comments from the photographer. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,864,322 and 5,479,228 relate to an APS type of camera in which a film having a magnetic memory portion is used and information such as year, month, and day, shutter speed and aperture value can be written on or, if necessary, read from this magnetic memory portion by means of a magnetic head, or information written in advance such as the ISO and the specified number of film frames is read from the same. Also, various kinds of data which are recorded on the magnetic memory portion as mentioned above are imprinted together with an image such as a person's image, if desired, when the film is printed. Although a limited voice sample can be recorded on the magnetic memory portion, as a practical matter, the audio data recorded is limited by the relatively small space of the magnetic memory portion of the film.
An alternative to annotating the APS picture with the sound clip is to type in the description to be recorded on the magnetic memory portion of the film by means of a keyboard. The keyboard may be mounted internally or externally to the camera. In the event of an internally mounted keyboard, the keyboard may be a rotary, dial-in type camera to conserve space on the camera or may be a chicklet type found in palmtop computers. However, the miniature keyboard is inconvenient to use due to its small size. The conventional keyboard is relatively bulky and is undesirable as a part of the photography equipment. Further, the use of the keyboard forces the user to focus on his or her typing skill rather than the picture-taking process. Hence, critical shots may be missed while the photographer fiddles with the keyboard. In sum, existing cameras do not offer the ability to conveniently and quickly record data such as aperture settings and shutter speeds, free-form comments and/or drawings/sketches in conjunction with photographic negatives as they are exposed, thereby eliminating the potential errors and time consuming effort involved in manually recording and organizing/matching such data with the appropriate negative. Further, existing cameras do not offer a light weight and reliable solution for recording camera settings and drawing/text annotations on the film.
The ability to annotate a message with drawings is also important in the communications applications in the two-way messaging industry and the cellular communications industry. Recent developments in portable communication systems have enabled portable data computers systems to provide data message communication capability over conventional radio frequency (RF) channels. As is known in the art, such RF data communication systems have a base station with full duplex capability, a network control processor, a front end to a host system computer, and one or more mobile portable computers operating in half-duplex mode. As noted in U.S. Pat. No. 5,459,458, entitled "VIRTUAL TWO-WAY COMMUNICATION DEVICE FOR GENERAL PURPOSE DATA TERMINAL", it is desirable to incorporate paging-type functionality with portable computers, personal intelligent communicators and the like to permit a single device to offer both paging, data communication and computing capabilities. However, existing two-way communication devices cannot support graphical data entry, either from a page originator or a page respondent. The ability to transmit and reply with graphical and text information would allow users to more effectively communicate or to browse information using two-way communication devices or cellular phones.